Xwejni Bay is a picturesque inlet just off Marsalforn where salt is still produced from the pens cut out in the rocks. The idyllic setting provides a perfect getaway, but it could have been a different story had the Borg Olivier government of 1969 not denied a development grant to the Pisani brothers. It was a time when the Borg Olivier administration was trying to diversify the economy and encourage a fledgling tourism industry by giving hoteliers favourable terms and public land on the cheap. The model worked, and Malta gradually started seeing hotels going up, providing much needed employment in sectors other than the British services. Fast forward three decades and that very same model based on generous terms and the use of public land continued to be used by subsequent administrations. In the 1990s, the Fenech brothers pulled down the Hilton hotel and rebuilt it within the confines of a bigger project that included a yacht marina hewn into the rocky coast and hundreds of luxury apartments. Controversy surrounded that project, later to be known as Portomaso. The entire area was leased by the State to the developers for Lm191,000 (€445,000) until 2114. It was eventually sold...
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